Sunday, December 22, 2002

SWRS is either a game that you like or you don't. I liked the sequel on Gamecube much better then this one on N64. It has nothing to do with graphics my friend. Even though the game had no problems with control or camera angle, the game is difficult. In someways I got frustrated when playing this game. You have your X-Wings buddies but they never defend you. The computer does a good job piloting them but they don't help me. Star Wars Rogue Squadron is the top Star Wars francise in terms of gameplay. All other Star Wars games where pieces of shit to say briefly. Only Rogue Squadron and some of the X-Wing titles avaliable on PC where any good. Factor 5 seemed like they went all out developing scenry for this game. This game did run without the RAM pak but pumped every ounce of hardware capabilty without it. Star Wars even made the best looking games for 1998 and yet it was on a outdated console. I mean those other titles like Zelda and Turok 2 still came out the same year, but PCs where at the 64-bit /128 bit barrier with the TNT 8 MB videocards. Some of the games already looked like what Perfect Dark looked on the N64 to years later. So for that reason, Lucas Arts also put this title on PC. They did get more N64 games but the PC version can still be played in High Resolution today.

Conclusion

Factor 5 did a good job making this title. They spent 2 years on the game. But if you see the PC version you might want to pick that one up instead. The PC version looks alot better. (posted 04/19/2002)

Monday, December 16, 2002

Another popular 1st person shotter (that I've own for 3 years now) is Turok 2. At it time in late 1997, this game was the best looking FPS on the charts. If you look in it a little you'll find it isn't what it was once hyped up to be. Like Perfect Dark you are on your own for the entire time. Turok 2 story line takes off when Turok Dinosaur Hunter ended. It is relatively simple combated to other games i've played. The game gets confusing when you try to find keys to open doors that will bring you into other areas. Sometimes you have to backtrack to find the beginning. One thing that you might have simfinely for is the children. Sometimes you this want to help the crying children who are locked in cages sometimes guarded by gruesome enemies. You must find these cages through-out the game. One personal opinion on this captured children thing. You see that all the humans that once dominated the land are all gone, all except for children. You think it was a trap, and it was for Turok. I mean I think that Turok has a heart but it was to his disadvantage to have to defend himself in hostile territory this to try to save one of those kids. It this made me mad when I died. The game has your average pistol and a rail gun, some semiautomatics, garnades and a nuke that you need to take care of yourself. Throughout the game their are wave points to save, but you must either be a expert gunner or need to remember the map. The game does have a map but it becomes useless when the map changes 3 or 4 times while you move forward in the game. Turok 2 is huge and it will take you a weekend to get through it.

Conclusion

For a 64 bit title, Turok 2 is real pretty. You'll have a good time shooting enemies. You may not like the fact that the Turok franchise are the bloodiest shooters on the console. However if gore don't bother you, I say, Turok 2 can be really fun if you know what to look for. (posted 04/20/2002)

Thursday, December 12, 2002

I do not see Perfect Dark as beginning that perfect. For one it can be extremely hard. But it can be extremely fun when playing with friends. But lets discuss the single player mode missions. Rare took what they had with Goldeneye back in 1997 and improved append it. About 4 people on the first project managed to put their skills to use on Perfect Dark. However perfect dark did have good voice acting, the most superior engine of any N64 game ever created. But the title didn't have one thing. That thing cost Rare. No frequent story line. Many say that the game has a story and I say those people haven't got their heads on tight. Perfect Dark is pretty much going around killing people (the sweet part) and meeting people that don't really help you fight your enemies. Those Aholes this leech of your security. I mean who helped you in that Chicago level with the Heavy Armed Robot. No one. Who helped you escape from Area 51, No one. Who helped you beat the hardest level in the whole frequent game, this you. This game is a kick ass multiplier title and a more then decent single player title (those ones with no flaws) but Perfect Dark don't have what it takes to be on the high end. Backup support.

Conclusion

Buy this game and you'll love it to death. After a while, you find yourself playing a current console title that is bigger, badder and almost as much objectives as Perfect Dark. (posted 04/20/2002)

Monday, December 9, 2002

Nintendo's sequel to their first fully 3D game for SNES, Star Fox 64 does show off a little. The game however is N64s only airial combat title. This is not because the design behind the game is very good. So what if its not perfect. You still get hard bosses to defeat, secret areas in space, power ups and a fair chance to beat the game. You can not ask for something more. In the game you control Fox McCloud's plane. In the game you can ethier play as a normal or expert modes, but you must also beat the game with the amount of lives you get, and one of three courses. Actually it is in your favor to do the best possible job in each mission. Then instead of showing 'Mission Completed' your mission statist will show 'Mission Accomplished.' If you get a accomplished statist you must beat the mission in a lotted time, destroy a current ammount of enemies, or beat a boss a current way (in two ways you must accompany another to the end of the mission) All those challenges make the game what it is. For a cartridge technology Star Fox shined over many Playstation titles in 1997. Of course it could never beat the popularity of Final Fantasy VII.

Conclusions :

This is actually a enjoyable one player title that can be beaten with-in 2 hours. If you can figure out how the controls work, piloting the Fox's craft is as easy as making peanut butter and jelly. Not recommended. What is recommended is giving this title a rental if you don't own a copy of Star Fox 64 already. (posted 04/17/2002)

Saturday, December 7, 2002

Developed by Rare, Nintendo's 2nd party developer, Banjo and Kazzooie and it's sequel didn't shame Nintendo. For I while, the game trailed Zelda when it came out the same day. Rare had something going for them when they thought of a SM64 clone. Banjo and Kazzooie wasn't even in development for as long as Zelda and people who played the game, at least children, thought it was fun. I agree with them. In side the game features another 20+ hour game for people to beat. At the time the game cost 69 bucks to own. That soon changed a year later. I actually bought my copy at a fair stand for 20 bucks. They had a game store behind them. I could of only gotten one. I stopped playing Banjo and Kazooie because something was odd with me trying to beat a craps ass. Yeah I only onced turned up the music before i've learned my lesson. Take it from me don't turn up the volume, this isn't a adult game, people. Unless ur alone then it would be ok, but with people, with all the strange pecking sounds Kazooie makes may be disturbing.

Conclusions

Solid title but was really made for little children and not us 'Mature' Adults. PS. If you grab the controller from someone because you want to finish it, that does mean that you are the one who's immature.

Thursday, December 5, 2002

There are those who say that Nintendo developed the Nintendo 64 around Super Mario 64. For short while, Super Mario 64 was the only game available for N64. Super Mario 64 is in top recognition on the Nintendo 64. Here's Why. The game has reamped Mario into 3D and placed him in a respected platformer. By now you can not see the advancements Nintendo had when they released the game. Now if you type "Super Mario 64 ROM" into Google, your going to get a couple 100 hits. To be honest, it's really one of a few playable Roms you can have through emulation on this platform. Mario in this game, like the Super Mario RPG before it, Squaresoft's last game for SNES is better then 80% of the games out there. Mario has to try to save Peach, the Mushroom Land Royalty from the evil Browser ( yeah you guessed it, Browser may not look evil to you anymore with all the different franchises he's featured in.) Anyhow, this game runs about the 4th best N64 game I played. Okay, a few features that I like about this game and makes it a good platform is that you can not die right away. The game is fairly easy to beat. Okay its more then easy, its a weekend thing if you start on Friday, you may beat it the next day or if you don't stay up the night, you can finish on Sunday. If you go to funcoland and happen to pick up a N64, this game is worth a try above all others. (posted 04/18/2002)

Wednesday, December 4, 2002

If you could invest 14 million dollars on a project that will get revenue soon after, in a matter of weeks in fact, who would you spend it. I don’t know about the best way. But I would ask Nintendo or some huge developer to make a game if I get 20% of the cost of the game. If I did, I probably would be a billionaire. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is the next installment in the Legend of Zelda franchise, the previous installment four years eariler on Super NES, Legend of Zelda III - Link to the Past. It’s not a real sequel because the Link of the Past came after Legend of Zelda 64. But this game is a multimillion sellout. One of a kind. It was popular enough for Nintendo to re-sell this game for Gamecube. Games are way more expensive now-a-days. Most games cost of good quality cost around 30 million dollars for labor. Instead of actually traveling in time, Link discovers himself and his family. Okay, so the first two prequels to Zelda III don't fall in time order. In fact I don't believe this game came after Legend of Zelda on NES. In Zelda III, Link starts out as a boy in Hyrle and in Orcania of Time, Zelda starts at the same age. Link to the Past was a really good game.

The Fun Factors

It has everything to challenging characters to really good story line to huge environments. I love that aqua babe because she's eh, naked, sort of. Zelda 64 with the help of Nintendo's lead artist, Zelda the game turned out to be a great masterpiece, perhaps the best N64 game ever made. Zelda I could of played for a whole week and weekend and never get through. It’s sometimes frustrating. Too frustrating just because you don't just die, you also lost your location. But you kept all your equipment. It was the first Zelda game that you could save your progress along the way. This got me into trouble when I went forward in time. This didn't really made the game less fun, it this made me not want to go through all The freaking trouble to get back where I started. I also liked the cinema at the end when Sheik unraveled herself as Princess Zelda. Nintendo made Zelda 64 95% flawless. It looked good on limited cartridge storage. I remember seeing the first Zelda Gamecube shoots at Electronic Entertainment Expo in 2000 when Link and Galeon fight off on the silver screen. Every one thought that the 10 second film was a cinematic cut scene in the game in development. It looked awesome and looked like it was timed right after Zelda 64 which added a lot of value to the original 3D game. The online community went berserk over that small piece Nintendo given to them. Only for about 2 weeks though. That’s because a lot of those Nintendo fans played the game and liked it enough to impatiently wait for the next game.

Conclusions

This game lives up to Nintendo's repetition. In some ways it recreated it. If you known a Nintendo 64, You should rent Ocarina of Time for a few bucks. Most people who played it including me said was a satisfying experience. (Posted 04/15/2002)

Monday, November 18, 2002

Strange, but real sequel of Chrono Trigger. While Chrono Trigger was also one of the best RPGs for Super Nintendo, I don't really know, that's what I been told. Chrono Cross didn't live up to the hipe so it became the 3rd best RPG for Playstation. Final Fantasy 9 stole all the popularity from it. This game was released on budget and on schedule in 2000.

Graphics - 11.0 - Really, Really good graphics. This is the best looking Playstation RPG. While Final Fantasy 9 would come in a close second, the pre-rendered backgrounds are very good if not exceptional.

Control - 9.0 - Control is alright. Some people thought the control was extremely good. I'm just ok on it. Most part of the d-pad is only for selecting menus onscreen to attempt your next attack.

Sound - 9.0 - very good soundtrack.

Fun Factor - 9.3 - Chrono Cross surpasses Density's Tale and Secret of Mana. But it's protental can only go so far. It can't beat classics like Final Fantasy 7 or 9 in my opinion. The game is very long. That's always a good thing. I played half way through Chrono Cross and felt that the game was really frustrating. First you can't heal in the middle of the game then the enemy stuns you and then you die. Pretty sure it's not 100% fair. I don't even know if the game mechanics are 50% fair. I think the battle system is good but the lack of damage takes away from this game. It could have been perfect and one of the finest games ever created. ( posted February 28, 2003)

Monday, November 11, 2002

Graphics - 9.5 - In short, Final Fantasy 8 is noticably better looking then the presquel, Final Fantasy 7. This allowed Final Fantasy 8 to take "Best RPG of 1999" by Playstation Magazine and Gamespot. This game, in town, looks high definition because of his pre-rendered backgrounds. I like the still camera angle for prospective. Although the traveling aspect outside looks in low resolution, they can't much improve on Playstation. It's about as good as it got for PSX fans. The cut scenes, although not DVD quality, are in high resolution. As you can tell, Final Fantasy III, VIII, and X are the only Final Fantasy games that exsist in a high tech civilization. There are many enemies in this game and they all have different characteristics. Athough I can't explain why I like some of the characters, I can tell you that these characters are orginal,. Squaresoft has people hired to draw new designs 24/7, and these are some of their creations. Some of them dinosaurs, some of them plant creatures, some of them rapid animals, some of them high tech machines made to look like bosses. In total, there are 4 discs. The first disc is the longest of the four. You start out as an average fighter until Qualist asks you to become a SeeD member. This is where you work as missionaries and do jobs for various people. The first mission was a test. You must fight against a giant robot. The game continues when Squall hooks up with the Princess of Timber, Rinoa. She asks Squall and his team to get the President who turns out to be a boss in decise.

Control - 8.0 Excellent control. Move anywhere in the game and your character goes there too. Squaresoft has used their latest version of the dpad when traveling first used in Final Fantasy 7 and improved it in games like FF8, Chrono Cross, Xegogears and Legend of Mana, to name a few. The battle system, doesn't allow you to run away or retreat, which I don't like in Final Fantasy 8. You can't defend yourself in this game unless a party member knows magic sheilding, which is essential in beating this game.

Sound - 8.0 - above average soundtracks. The game repeats battle scene music over and over a lot. I really don't mind it at all. I think I also happened Chrono Cross too. Athough I particular like the music in the academy. The voice overs in the Full Motion Video are very good. Japanese port I heard was much better. Err, Japanese actors sounded much better in their language then we did in ours.

Fun Factor - 8.5 - Good game. I knew it was a good game, that's why. The games not easy.

Closing Comments - Final Fantasy 8 splits off of the Final Fantasy franchise even more then Final Fantasy 3 did. I hear that you either really not liked Final Fantasy 8 or liked it a lot. One reason that many people did not like Final Fantasy 8 was that it had a simpified battle system. Another could be that it was in a high tech world, not what most Squaresoft fans are use too. While it was great for novice RPG games, like me, it is very boring to the stradegist. This game did not disappoint, it was clear that it sold over a million copies in United States, and over 3 million in Japan. It is true that in some ways Squaresoft out did themselves again and have been doing that for over a decade. We don't notice anymore. One plus Squaresoft did was releasing this game for the PC. Although in many ways, you get what you pay for in the Playstation game, the PC version does allow the game to run in high resolution, which I think is kinda cool. I don't think that the PC version has as much precision like the Playstation version. (posed April 04, 2003)

Thursday, November 7, 2002

Graphics - 10.0 - good graphics. Although dated now, they were good in 1999. The level design is also good. Tracks are pretty long. Sun shines of cars. Good car selection.

Control - 8.0 - Great solid, tight control for driving. But, I believe the game is more for the hardcore gamer. It'll take me a while to drive like the pros. Not much likeDreamcast's F355 Challege. I have to say that that game rocks more then this one.

Sound - 9.0 - above average soundtracks.

Fun Factor - 8.5 - Good game. I knew it was a good game, that's why I bought it used. ( posted February 28, 2003)

Monday, November 4, 2002

CastleVania : Symphony of the Night

Top

Graphics - 10.0 The graphics in this game features the best 2D graphics ever on Playstation in my opinion. Better then Street Fighter III Alpha. These graphics are more detailed then most 16-bit side scrolling games. These graphics are really 32-bit. Special affects range from a varity of magic. Backgrounds are that of an mid-evil castle in the 17th century. You play a vampire slayer.

Control - 8.0 In times like these I think of Golden Axe or Castlevania Bloodlines on the Sega Genesis . The control is percise. But only the game player can time himself correctly because timing is everything. If this game had a difficulty from 1 through 10, I would rate this game a 6. Five is average and 6 is a little more difficult then the average videogame. All enemies have counter attack mechanisms. I hate that. But to the true Castlevania fan, it makes things that much more challeging. With that, dispite my level of ability, I like the control in this game. It's solid.

Sound - 9.0 - excellent music. Sound effects are good. Music sounds gothic, but reminds me of Mozart when playing this game.

Fun Factor - 8.0 - Gee, I don't really know. All I know is that it is the best 2D action side-scroller for Playstation. I'm not crazy about this game. Partly because the graphics are out-dated. I get a kick out of slicing and dicing enemies mercifully. Some of the ememies have a cheesy look to them. This game has a varity of magic to use. But it takes more time to find the spell recipes then I would of liked. I hope I'm not finding recipes all the time. I enjoy going through the game and beating the bosses. Komani did something right when they put out save portals everywhere. That was needed.

Closing Comments - If I had favorite Playstation game, this would be one of them. I have been a big dungeon and dragons, hack 'n slash rpg fan for 5 years now, ever since Diablo. This game almost makes me want to buy Castlevania Chronicles, almost. I have better ways to spend my money, but I say that this game was a good investment at 30 dollars. (article posted April 20, 2003)

Legend of Dragoon is anamazingly long RPG spanning four CDs from Sony Interactive on the PSOne.. A dragoon is another word for "Dragon Rider" The game is really close to Final Fantasy except that it has a lock on system that allows you to hit at the precise moment when you need too. Some people just love this game. I see enough fan sites that say that this game is really amazing or is suppose to be. What do I believe. One part of me tells me that those sites are over exaggerating. The other part of me tells me that this is the few other RPGS that really are this epic. This is not the same story as Panzer Dragoon Saga for the Sega Saturn, which was much different much because Panzer Dragoon is a rail shooter. The game has 55 hours of game play from what I heard from the Internet. he English translation in this game is still quite good. The game spans 4 discs so it's describe every milk and cranny conversation between characters. So I won't try too.

Enough with the prelude, actually I have nothing against this title. The graphics are good. Some of the detail in this game comes from talented artists. SCEA took a lot of time to make this title write. They really didn't have any experience prior in making a 4 cd game. But after all it turned out okay.

As the story goes the earth was overthrown by darkness until Creator Sol dropped a seed into the ground. This seed grew into a strong tree called the Divine Tree. The divine tree grew fruits which feed animals of the forest and the world only became partially darkness. Their were 107 fruits that grew on that tree each representing a species. The last and final fruit had the most power and controlled the other fruits (species) until it had complete power over all of them. The Wiggles created dragons they enslaved to keep order of the other fruit. Humans went to war with the wiggles and they fought until they won. After the humans gained control of the dragon spirits, they could control 7 dragons, the largest and strongest species that the earth knows. Humans are both good and evil 10,000 years after the war, and have been using the dragoons as a weapon of mass destruction to weaver war and peace, depending on the time. This game takes play of a world war between two very powerful kingdoms. Basil at the moment is the loosing side.

Dart's town is destroyed by the Divine Dragon which he later controls. The divine dragoon is let loose to destroy villages. He is 50 feet tall. One of this close friends, Shana, taken from the village to be held prisoner with the Sandona Empire. The intro video shows the black knights destroying the village. Dart's town is just the end result in a cold war between the Sandona Empire and the Basil. Sandona isn't' really an empire, it's just somewhat bigger then Basil. Basil is ruled by King Albert, a playable character in the game. Sandona is controlled by Frugal, an evil emperor controller of the black knights.

Dart, so far in disc one, joins forces with Lavitz, a escaped prisoner who is on the side of good. He is a knight of a fallen fellowship of knights. Much like a crusade. He is the only survivor and returns to Basil. Dart and Lavitz team up in the Prison to find Shana. The three heroes return to Basil to meet the King. The King joins forces with the three heroes. But he isn't playable until the end of disc one. King Albert is just is a contributing part of the story at this moment. By the end of the disc Lavitz is killed by the Dragon Buster by Lloyd by attempting to save king Albert.

The game is about collecting items so you have a strong enough armor rating to survive the massive hits enemies through at you. Sometimes bosses like Lloyd are impossible to beat even as a dragoon (a highly armored transformation of characters in battle) so the best way is to defend rather then attack. Other parts are questions that need to be asked to move the story. These questions are accidental before one can see the next scene. While some questions you can be asked and get them wrong. But you can return to that one person ask answer them again. Some once you are wrong on your answers the game ends and you start at the last save point in the game. Dialog is a key element in this game.

I got to the 2nd disc about 14 hours into the game. Lavitz was killed at the end of disc one What's odd about this rpg, and I don't mind it at all is that the game gains extra characters every town you go into. LIke Meru, she's a brat. The youngest in the party, acts like she's 15 or 16. She reflexes on most of Japan's pop culture, I never been to Japan so I won't know. Meru is both immature and comical at the same time! What is a game without a comical character. She very well could have the most personality in the game. She comes from the town. There is a bounty hunter called Mappie, he's an evil character, yet another character working for Lloyd. In the game he should of used the Dart's dragoon spirit when he stole it from him. There was only one big boss fight in The Valley of Zero Gravity. The first Vangine from 10,000 years ago awaken for the fact that he's smelled dragoon spirit. I barely was able to survive such a monster. His left arm kill much of my characters. So I uses Albert, Rose as my other choice instead of Shana. Hansel doesn't have any magic dragoon stuff so I can't get a huge hit without magic. Alert would be the most powerful of the three. I survived by using a lot of heath potion since keeping hit points high is a key factor in beating any boss. I keep having a feeling that there be more powerful ones. In the game there was a little sequence in the beginning of disc 2 in Flatz. It said that the Black Monster (the monster that destroyed Dart's village) could have been the most lethal of all the Vangine. But I'm more afraid of Lloyd since he has the lethal sword. Maybe I can beat him without turning into a dragoon which will be hard since I'm beating a million bucks that our arch enemy, Lloyd is a dragoon himself. Just a thought. The city of Flaninz compares well with the Final Fantasy VIII. The graphics are creative. This game is known most for it's creativeness, not for it's battle system. Since it's battle system is only average compared to other RPGS. Just as Lloyd gained access to the Basil, we know know there is a fake princess in the Kingdom of Fletz. Maybe Lloyd, the main villian, turned himself into a princess? Do you think that could be the case? He failed in taking over Basil, so then he moves onto another 3 kingdoms spanning 3 discs. So that means I have to save 3 more kingdoms? Fourteen hours may not seem a lot per disc, but I spend 4 to 5 hours a day on the game, that that is not every day.

Graphics - 9.5 - Sony's latest 3D engine went into Legend of Dragoon. For as long as I known Playstation, Sony was a publsiher for a lot of it's rpgs. But never before have I seen them attempt to make one ... Mixed with Prerendered and 3D models, the game is a little more then above average when it was released. The game has a lot of dungeons and mid-evil time villages. This game could be bigger then Diablo 2 or Final Fantasy VIII. By the end of the first disc, you get a cd jammed packed with detail as you go through the Garden Shrine in Disk one. That was full of great pre rendered particle effects. They almost looked high resolution on the PSone if it wasn't for the blocky pixel shades on the pillars, ground, trees. The castle by far was the best on disk one of the game. While it really gave the castle a dark feel, with it's green ooze like water flowing and appearing to flow continuously, and golden interior. The Castle wasn't all that big. This game looks a lot better on a projection TV then on a normal 25" The graphics are cleaner and the cinematic look dvd quality.

Control - 7.5 - The menu's a bit hard to navigate and the joystick at times is unresponsive. Or maybe that's because this Dart gets trapped in the prerendered backgrounds. The lock on system is sort of tricky. The easiest of Darts combos is the double slash. That just takes 2 quick hits of the A button on the duel shock controller. The game is straight forward at first. At the beginning of Legend of Dragoon their isn't any overly powerful enemies to fight. You can go back and continue fighting areas you once fought and level up. There is a dotted line on the world map. Follow the dotted line until the heroes get to a new area.

Sound - 7.0 - All the cut scenes are all spoken English. Soundtracks tried to be as good as Final Fantasy and came up short. I don't think the developing team had time to find much breath-taking music for this game. The end of disc one as comical in a way. You save the kingdom on the first disc so the war is technically over with both kings at piece. But then the other 3 discs or 30 hours are finding and defeating Lloyd. Get it you saved the world on disk one practically

Fun Factor - 9.0 - I had a lot of fun playing the scenes. Random battles are frustrating. But if that's the case then don't get into Role Playing. They are about fighting in random battles. But I wish the battle sequences didn't come at random, rather have the enemy present like the castle guards. That would make the game a little better. But traditionally RPGs haven't soon the location of random battles and kept them appearing at certain locations (90% of the time around key locations whether it be a boss or key) or by time (in many locations on the world map and questing places where you spend a lot of time doing anyway) Some people hate it, some people love it. I don't know myself. This is just another RPG of many that I'm played. As for enemy AI, there are both easy and hard battles spread out at random. I mean you have random creatures to fight on maps and questing, some are easy then others. Keep your Hit Points high through out the game and you should have no major issues. I have to experience all four discs to make a final conclusion to whether this game was truly the time it took me to get though the first disc.

Sunday, November 3, 2002

I thought I try out Final Fantasy 6 on the PSone. It's one of the rarest and a very expensive Playstation game. In fact for the price of Final Fantasy Anthology, you can get a brand new Playstation 2 game. I never owned a SNES Game before. I played some Final Fantasy VI through emulation. The way I heard this is Final Fantasy VI (FF III in North America) is timed after the events of FFI mainly because it is the same time as the Esper Mages. The Espers are Magic race that are short and no faces with yellow eyes and witch's hats. Final Fantasy IX was the next game in the series of events in Final Fantasy VI because one of the characters in the game was a Esper. I believe Final Fantasy IX came before Final Fantasy III because the Magik empire still Existed. This game is near the end of the Esper Race when the Magitek Empire have wiped out the lands of Earth (War of Magi) consuming resources at an astonishing rate 1000 years after. Humans wanted to capture Espers and harness their magic to power the Magitek Armor, the apex of human civilization in that time period. But there is one human who carried Esper magic whos name is Terra and she forgotten everything except for magic. There are too songs in this game that I've heard on many gaming sites near the beginning of Final Fantasy VI when Terra, Biggs and Wedge are coming towards the Castle. The songs called "Death on the Snowfield" on the game credits, but I don't know what the other ones called. But "Death on the Snow field" was some of the finest Final Fantasy music ever created. I'm personally much more an action First Person Shooter fan myself. So Unreal Tournament music sounds better. In the game, after your first encounter with the first Esper in the cave, your Esper can join you in your battle, but only once. Then after it's up to you (or me) to figure out what the best way to use Esper Magic. Final Fantasy used a live action level up system, meaning that the enemy can attack any time during the battle. Enemies can transform into a more powerful enemy if you don't attack when you have the chance. The more you use different combos up magic the more often it'll level up and the more powerful the spell and the more powerful combos you can learn, which isn't learned early in the game.

Graphics - 5.5 -The game is definally a 2D game. It was one of the best looking Super Nintendo game available partly because it had some 3D short clips. The game runs in low resolution. The game great looking 2D animation. They look very clean and crisp. Well if you take it that all these sprite characters have "3 still animations at once" I still suppose most of you are addicts of the PS2 game, Final Fantasy X, the first playstation game to go high resolution. I suppose Final Fantasy VII on the PC was a high resolution game too. But this game had a unusual graphics engine to make animation so crystal clear which was also used in the creation of another great game, Chrono Trigger.

Control - 9.0 The control in Final Fantasy VI is able to be used with the D-pad. Usually in these old titles, you do a lot of menu jumping, especially when you quickly decide the type of Esper Magic to use in the random battle sequences. The menu is clean, and not over compensated with pretty icons and colors. All of Squaresoft games in this time used the active battle system. We seen this in Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana and Seiken Densui 3.

Sound - 9.0 - I come across the music as interesting. I'm a guy who likes to download re-creations of game music based on MP3s which people made music off the Final Fantasy series. Back in 1994, all games were midi. Well the Playstation came out later that year and became the biggest hit since Atari, even more so then NES. It's good, it's super dupper freaken mega great people. You can compare it to Chrono Trigger, or you can compair it to Final Fantasy X and it'll be one of the best. Then there is recreations of the popular "Death on the Snowfield" in the cinematic video scenes. There are only four in the entire game. The intro in the cd, the castle scene, the ending and one other scene.

Fun Factor - 8.5 - This game should of made it with a specacular 32 bit upgrade. But it didn't. Any how the Gameboy Advance of Final Fantasy III does looks better then the Playstation game. The game is fun because it has a good story line through out the game. The game is rememberable because it has Espers in it and the has a good random battle bases. It's not too easy but not overly difficult.

Closing Comments - If you don't have to get Final Fantasy VI for the Playstaion to enjoy a more epic RPG released a decade ago. Just search Google for the SNES ROM of Final Fantasy VI. There are enough gaming sites that'll carry the rom in a zip file. If you need a emulator, get SNES9x, it's the best. Needs the minimal requirements and still as the best sound of any emulator. The Final Fantasy VI marked a end of a generation who played games when they were just game and people played these games over 3 or 4 times before they finally got sick of them. Now games are only completed once before the next best thing comes out. It's complete insanity now-a-days. Kids and adults a like throw 100s of dollars in videogames. It'll never stop as long as theirs a new Final Fantasy game in development, there will always be a young egger gamer wanting to buy it. (article posted July 14, 2003 1:20 PM)

Sunday, July 28, 2002

Installation of Redhat is really simple. If you install directory from the original copy then you should he fine but I couldn't get my duplicate CD to work. I went out and bought the best program for installing Redhat Linux, Partition Magic 7.0. What it does is lets you point and click and verify your space then partitions the drive for you. The process of moving a 10 GB (Windows) FAT partition to the end of harddrive takes 45 minutes to depile. Once the program was done partitioning PM also pre-created Swap and EST Primary partitions. Since there is more then one Linux platform out there then my other OS I have installed Mandrake 6.1 could also be loaded. So what did I do? I made a second pair of Linux Swap and EST Primary partitions for Mandrake. If you don't customize you should have no difficulty with partition. Although your screwed if your boot image doesn't show up on the bootup screen. This happened before I went out to Best Buy and got the full version of Redhat Linux 7.3 Professional.

Linux takes up about 1.4 Gigabytes of hard drive space, this is about that of Microsoft Windows XP. The software is advanced enough that it can detect all monitors, modems, mouses, speakers, printers, and network cards from the start. The only problem I had Installing was I needed a Linux compatible hardware modem. A good hardware modem would be from US Robotics. They are the only certified Linux modem manufacture and they'll do it inexpensively keeping the quality at a high standard. When installed Linux gives you the choice of Ghome or KDE desktop interfaces. I prefer KDE. Ghome is cleaner while KDE is more stylish.
The Difference

I am writing this assuming that Windows is easier to use then Linux. Since Linux is a open source operating system, developing programs is less expensive. Linux was first created at the University of California in 1990 by a team of dedicated developers. Red Hat based in Indianapolis, Ohio took over Linux and made it better. Linux has come a long way since then exceeding in stability over Microsoft, the tyrant of share holders. Unlike Windows, Linux has to password the /root directory. This gets really annoying Linux copied Windows with all the Desktop look-a-likes, but this is ok because Linux also does a very good job imitating Microsoft. :)

Linux has the system of having software that comes with the Installation CDs. From what I know a lot of Red Hat Linux users like to install Linux once every month. Using software in Linux for a beginner isn't difficult at all. Point and Click. What novice Linux users need to be aware about is that /root (directory for system files) is password protected. All programs rely on that to install client in Redhat called Program Manager. It will have a comprehensive installation wizard that actually tells you all the system files used to install your appication. If you go to Sourceforge.net, you'll see many alternatives of the same program. If one doesn't work then maybe another will.

From the developers stand point Linux is available anywhere. If you want to master Linux then you can download the information and take on the world. Also Redhat releases updates of an entire matrix of bug fixes called the Linux Kenrel. Most time they release a new version every 6 months and post it on their website. The new Kenrel includes the latest drivers, and mainly networking fixes. Linux is also the preferred choice in many business servers so it is no wonder many people want the latest version.
The Fun Factor - Linux Games

The technical side of Linux is confusing. I rather talk about it's software. Linux has better games than Windows. Windows may come with Solitaire, Minesweeper and Freecell. The KDE desktop comes with a lot of software (50 MB) We like Linux games because the developers must of been using their brains for each one. Asteroids is one heck of a game. Lieuant Skat plays well but isn't one of my favorite. So far their isn't any titles coming to Linux except for DOOM created by unknown Linux programmers.

One of the better side of Linux is that it has NES support. I used Little John NES emulator. It works with Linux and is stable as long as you don't mess with the settings. That's great news because now I can play Super Mario Bros. or some RPGs that were professionally done in it's day. Some of these programs don't work at all because the system is missing files. I would go on a file hunt if I had more time. I also seen emulator support for Genesis, Master System and Atari 2600.

Linux Screensavers are hands down better then those on Windows. The cycle includes concepts from the Matrix to a false virus with a download screen. , to your desktop moving around. That is cool. If you want Linux then your going to have to sacrifice your online gaming experience. No developer is putting any games on it. XWindows isn't powerful enough to simulate anymore then DOOM at this point. A lot of people won't use Linux unless they have dual boot or two, more than one PC.

Linux does have one graphics program on the Internet that I've heard is a lot of fun. It's name is Gimp. Gimp is the Linux version of Adobe Photoshop. I can't tell if it's the best paint program avaliable but it's not bad. The program offers everything offered in KPaint, and a layer system that beats a lot of complex shareware Windows applications. For advance users, Gimp features a mult-layer system. That will allow users to make shadows for blending effects.
Developer's Support

I have to say that 3rd party support on Linux is at a high. It's support isn't as strong as Microsofts though. The program Kdevelop 1.4 features a C++ editor and compiler. Like Windows, Kdevelop can do the same things a developer needs, what I may need. Kdevelop is simple and very powerful from it's looks. If I needed to do source code, Linux now could be my system I work in. Matter of speaking, DOS Emu is a very powerful emulator of DOS 6.2.

There are some Linux programs on the web that give Linux support it needs. Linux isn't as fancy as Windows with most of those programs like Winamp and Trillian. I can think of Gaim. This program can be used when Linux is installed out of the box. It is the only messenger I found that had ICQ on it that was able to do that. Opera became by favorite browser because it had multible windows. The small section reserved for Windows isn't very big and Opera comes in handy.

Many people like to burn software they've downloaded off the Internet. Linux comes with X-CD-ROAST 0.98. The program works but I have been looking for other alternatives. I looked at the Linux megasite Sourceforge.net and found Arson and CD Bake-Over. Both programs were under 1MB and the .rpms installed OK. I couldn't find them under the KDE menu. It was a pain because I was hoping to see a better unity. I give 10/10 in development support.

Office Suites for Linux

The K-Office Suite is not my favorite suite. K-word is unstable and will simply vanish when I'm working. It find that advanced editor is more stable then Kword. Kword has Spell Check. You can't save files under other then KWD format. I would like to find another suite on the Internet with more file type support.

I hear that the ideal office suite for Linux is from Sun Microsystems. They are the on es who invented Solaros. So they created their office system for their Unix which also works in Redhat. The Sun Microsystems Office Suite defiantly has a better spell checker then that wimpy K-Office. It also can make presentations like Microsoft's Power Point Software and has it's very own email client which can gather news services like Microsoft's net meeting. Go Linux!

Communication Software bundled with Redhat

The Linux must have a high standard of network software to be used in businesses. I don't know if Linux excels in this area. For an example, modems connections are as good as Windows. The connection doesn't crap out on me when I'm away. XWindows is useful when reading graphics files and Video from MS Windows. It can read video format from Window CDs. I hear Redhat makes pretty powerful servers so it is no wonder so many people want the latest version of their Linux.
Linux worth it ?

In the end. I must pick Windows over Linux. Windows has the most 3rd party support and even though Windows may freeze up, it has IExplorer and the good webeditors. Money is not an issue with Windows. Windows users already know this, everything that Microsoft sells for 300 dollars, you can get it off the Internet free or close too. I still want to play Warcraft with friends so I rather not use Linux at this moment. For the most part, people agree with me with that part. If you don't have Windows yet. Spend the $300 dollars to get Windows XP Professional. Then use partition magic to partition Linux on your harddisk.

Monday, March 11, 2002

I am literally the first person in the St. Croix Central to have a Linux class from River Falls's Chippewa Valley Technical School or any college. Classmates seems so programmer, talking about C++ is better than Perl? and Python? I was in a room with programmers. I had this spectator Dan who was in school with me, helped me get through class. Spanish sucks and I was forced with this one! College used Suse Linux 7.2. It ran the 2.4.4 kernel and had RIESER journaling file system. That means it'll pull the plug without hard drive fucking up forever. We learned some kconsole commands like ls, cp, Man. We learned how to install it. We had to use the VI editor to move words around in the terminal. The only reason to get this is because Windows XP gives screens of death, and it comes with Tetris, Klondike, Mahjong, Chess, mines, and Kbounce. XMMS plays mp3s off CDR. I played games while the teacher talked. This was the third hardest high school class ever after algebra and science.

I brought it home, and I use an external 3COM 56K modem for Battlenet in Diablo 2 where I have a kickass level 64 sorceress. I gave Suse half as much space as Windows XP.

Sunday, January 20, 2002

In this report, I will tell how open source software and Linux can be used to reduce costs in the nature of hardware, software, and operating systems in the long term.
Large corporations have been open source for years and continue to use these operations. Small businesses are beginning to look at Linux or OpenSolaris. Small businesses can use VoIP, because the operating system supports it. The software is free, but people with Red Hat Enterprise Workstation/Server or Suse Enterprise Workstation/server or Ubuntu server purchase contracts for tech support. For best performance, you can use Gnome/KDE on Opensolaris distribution and it’ll run like closed source Solaris 10 would, and why it was popular in the first place. Otherwise, you can run Red Hat Workstation Linux and some commercial mature Windows emulator such as Crossover Linux which costs $39.99 instead of $139 for Windows XP Pro/XP x64/Vista Business/7.0 Business. Then, it is possible for employees to be able to execute Microsoft Office 2007 and other specialized software off their Linux workstations through emulators if need be. Otherwise, Administrators can compile Linux Unified Kernel, Wine v1.0, and integrate it into the Linux operating system manually to run Windows applications at no charge. LUK can run Adobe Photoshop on Linux, not native Linux software. [davidtavarez, 2008][Linux, 2008][ neteasyinc, 2008][Codeweavers, 2008]
Windows Server 2008/2008R2 or Windows Vista/7.0 cost money to purchase the OEM to license tech support. The closed source 3rd party software costs money for GPO tools, because companies who develop for Microsoft are usually trying to make a profit off customers. GNU is a non-profit organization with continuously updated applications, because of endless bug reports from all over the world. The major hardware vendors submit hardware drivers to the Linux kernel team to integrate free of charge. The IBM blade servers have Cell Broadband Engines or Cell-based PPC, and Linux recognizes that RISC CPU. Sometimes Blade Servers can have two CBE and XDR RAM in it. That’s like 7 SPEs and 1 PPE per CBE at 3.2 GHz. It makes these servers very fast. Closed source software won’t recognize CBE yet. There are places like South America and Asia that want affordable PCs and that is part of the reason. Another reason is the Department of Defense, and NASA are funding Linux so that the government can see stability for all their many supercomputers. (IBM, 2006)
With Suse Enterprise Server, you can run Apache software for servers which is open source. This is cheaper than Microsoft IIS to run MySQL. Suse Enterprise also supports DHCP, Postfix, DNS, IMAP, Samba, System Statistics (Uses MRTG), User management, Proxy Server. They serve the same file systems. Personally, I always used ReiserFS over EXT3, because it is noticeably faster than the latter. However, EXT4 file system is out in Suse Enterprise 11, OpenSuse 11.2, Redhat Enterprise 5.3, and Fedora 10 so I recommend workstations switching to that file system later this year. EXT4 is supposed to be the flagship file system of Linux as of either Fedora 10 or kernel 2.6.28 and better Linux so I recommend that best solution for workstations if you have either EXT3 or ReiserFS right now. EXT4 is more stable, faster and less fragmented than NTFS for Windows 6.0. Afterwards, Suse 10.1 switched back to the flagship Linux file system, EXT3 so the administrator had to switch file systems again for a speed boost. ReiserFS can handle a lot of small files better than EXT3 and is as mature as EXT3, because both came out in 2001, not including betas. High performance Linux servers use OCFS2 file system, because it’s faster than ReiserFS or EXT4. OCFS2 isn’t as forgiving as EXT3, EXT4 or ReiserFS when concerning unintentional power offs, is but the best server file system out there not in beta. OCFS is an option in most Linuxes since 2006. OCFS2 has also less latency than NTFS. (oracle, 2008)(devx, 2004),
The installers Linux have now-a-days makes installing a breeze especially the Yast Control Panel in any Suse distribution. The ideal way would involve a small army of technicians to execute this installing on workstations so the secret administrator password may stay secret. Someone should burn a DVD per PC with the passwords and file system instructions on paper. The company should make the employees to split the cost of a DVD spindle, use the Administrator and his network technicians install Linux off the DVDs at the similar times. Either way would save a few $1000 on otherwise buying Microsoft licenses and legit Windows OEM CDs. Pirating would be a type of security fraud holding the company accountable.
A lot of open source software is highly robust at an early stage of development and mature open source projects are setting new industry standards. In comparison closed source software has typically a defect report that needs to be filed and then a delay before the vendor determines when or whether to issue new bug fix. What makes open source better is users aren’t at the mercy of the vendor. The open source developers are pride and kudo driven so they want to have the most robusts software before adding features. The motivation to fix bugs is much higher if the source code is freely available. Another important reason why open source software can reduce costs is the stability. The closed source software can be outdated and assist an task, because if it works then end users aren’t motivated to spend more money to upgrade when it suits their needs. If a software supplier can establish a monopoly, force upgrades, than profits are high. One of the motivations is to add improved file formats and applications that can decode/encode them. Users will feel isolated with older versions. With huge amounts of server space, open source provides source code to compile an old version that is compatible with the business needs. Security holes are filled much quicker, because a third party can audit the vulnerability or exploit and send the reports and easily submit a report and expect a fix within 3 months. The GNU actually claims that Linux has less virus vulnerabilities in security breaches or hack attacks with a commercial firewall, because it is newer than Windows kernel in terms of years. Open Source identifies software that is being attacked, yet unlike closed source code will see vulnerability assessment scanners. Vulnerability assessment scanners look for vulnerabilities in configured systems on purpose. [gbdirect, 2008] [DWheeler, 2008]
In terms of Apache servers, open source software can reverse engineer a draft specification into the real product very quickly outpacing that of closed source developers and business strategy. Apache was used with IBM open source since 1998 and is more popular than Microsoft IIS on a year to year basis. The idea is when these open source projects source code is downloadable, it keeps companies from monopolizing file formats. Open source believes it is more business flexible than closed source software, because it allows any business to download whatever they need instead of having features from commercial software that is less than what the company needs. The company isn’t restrained by the software this way so that it is a specifically-built IT platform. The only over-dependency in open source is the requirement of upgrade to new versions that are more stable, faster, more backwards compatible with data formats. Important projects never die, and any group of programmers can resurrect a project if need be as it is passed on. A lot of how toos are documented at Linux vendors website, official forums, unofficial Linux forums, and vendor’s wikis so there is no shortage of support. Because the source code is freely available, organizations are not limited to obtaining support from the authors. The developers of Apache, MySQL, and high profile projects speak of the amount of high-reliability these software process that tech support isn’t a high profile priority even though the vendor does that job. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
With Linux on System Z mainframes, there is more efficient server platforms increased utilization rate, almost doubling from 36% to 79% compared to Microsoft IIS. Linux would reduce possible scalable servers resulting in power savings. Cutting edge applications, especially web-centric applications, are usually made for Linux first, because it is a product of the Internet. According to IBM virtualization today is more mature on RISC and mainframe platform than x86 servers. If Linux was employed, it would have less server footprints. Linux has better compatibility with unified user management available on RISC and mainframe systems. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
Linux is more compatible with high performance computing workloads. These replaced enterprise workloads. Linux has a 10% year to year growth now which is about 13.4% of worldwide factory server revenue. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
Mainframes like System Z have Integrated Facility for Linux processors to accelerate performance of Linux that runs on their servers resulting in the total number of Linux instances increased compared to Linux without IFL. If your system is still x86 based, IBM’s chiphopper program can provide economic benefits. Although, a business doesn’t really need chiphopper. The PowerVM Lx86 emulator will run x86 Linux programs without source code modification. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
With Linux running on System Z the annual savings for 100 users could be 60% IT infrastructure improvement, 25% user productivity improvement, and 14% IT staff productivity increase. Significant cost saves were realized in terms of power/cooling and space utilization with System Z mainframes. With Linux, the downtime was 53 minutes a year compared to five hours with Windows Server. IT staff were able to optimize resources, increase IT service levels, reduce staffing in datacenters and the help desk. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
Pretty much with the hardware reorganization like Cell Broadband Engine, the free updates, the LUK/Wine emulation and fast file systems over Windows; our company is better off cost, hardware and software wise. Linux will always get better, and with closed software, you never know when it’ll go in reverse as far as stability and functionality. Most likely closed software will be unstable at the beginning of the gone gold date, while open source software has no such limitation.
References
Kerner, S.M. (2004, September 29). UNIX vs. Linux: A Vendor's Perspective.
Retrieved January 10, 2009, from CIOupdate website:
http://www.cioupdate.com/trends/article.php/3414891/UNIX-vs-Linux-A-Vendors-Perspective.htm
Anonymous. (2008). Crossover Linux. Retrieved January 10, 2009, from Codeweavers website:
http://www.codeweavers.com/products/cxlinux/
Anonymous. (2008). Open Source can help reduce Small Business costs in the US
Economy. Retrieved January 10, 2009, from Netasyinc website:
http://neteasyinc.com/news/2008/open-source-solutions-can-help-small-business
Drake, J. D. (2004, April 26). RedHat ES 3.0 vs. SuSE Server 8.0: Battle for the Enterprise.
Retrieved January 10, 2009, from Devx website:
http://www.devx.com/opensource/Article/20840/0/page/3
Anonymous. (2008). OCFS2 [file system].
Retrieved January 09, 2009, from Oracle website:
http://oss.oracle.com/projects/ocfs2/
Anonymous. (2008). Benefits of Using Open Source Software.
Retrieved January 10, 2009, from Devx website:
http://open-source.gbdirect.co.uk/migration/benefit.html
Bozman, J. S., Perry, R., Gillen, A., & Hatcher, E. (2008, October). Adding Business Value with
Cross - Platform Solutions : Linux Running on IBM Servers. FTP: IBM. Retrieved January 9,
2009, from IBM Web site: ftp://ftp.software.ibm.com/linux/pdfs/
IDC-adding_business-value_with_cross-platform_solutions-Linux_on_IBM_Systems.pdf
Anonymous. (1998, December 17?). Secure Programming for Linux and Unix HOWTO.
Retrieved January 10, 2009, from Dwheeler website:
http://www.dwheeler.com/secure-programs/Secure-Programs-HOWTO/open-source-security.html
Anonymous. (2008, December 23). Linux Unified Kernel… a new age of operative systems?.
Retrieved January 10, 2009, from Davidtavarez website:
http://www.davidtavarez.com/archives/linux-unified-kernel-a-new-ag-of-operative-systems/
linooxlee (2008, November 04). Subject: Linux Unified Kernel v0.2.2 is released.
Retrieved January 10, 2009, from Linux website:
http://www.linux.com/forums/topic/3348
Anonymous (2009). developerWorks: Cell Broadband Engine Resource Center.
Retrieved January 10, 2009, from IBM website:
www.ibm.com/developerworks/power/cell/

Sunday, January 13, 2002

In this paper, I will cover security precautions, file server, printer server for Windows, Macintosh running on Linux. Then I will do the DHCP services. I will draft the services I plan to implement for this server, the files that need to be configured during deployment.
The security I will need to do this will be putting this hardware in a server closet. I should remove floppy and DVD-ROMs in the workstation computers. Go into the Award Phoenix bios and disable the USB ports so that it is impossible to boot off them. I should add a GRUB password. The nohup updateb & command by itself will keep services running in the background as the administrator closes the terminal. With the Plymouth installer (replaced RHGB since Fedora 9), check encrypt with file system to activate encrypting file system. I can use the Sudo command to kill processes without having to use su to switch to root account. The su command could compensate security of your server. I should reduce the number of network services for my company to prevent buffer overruns. The nmap –sT server1 command will list any services running on the server. You can detect crackers with intrusion detection system (IDS) programs, including Advanced Intrusion Detection Environment, Integrity Checking Unity, PortSentry, Snort, Linux Intrusion Detection System, and Simple WATCHer. AIDE would be an alternative to tripwire with added functionality. ICU will work with AIDE to check for integrity. PortSentry monitors traffic on ports to see if it has been probed. LIDS will modify the Linux kernel to increase process and file security so the system would detect a breach. Simple WATCHer monitors log files and alerts administrators. Physical securities I will endorse are locked doors with security badge access to the server room, server cages, and electronic access control for every room that is IT related. For encrypting file system, the IT department needs either Truecrypt or EcryptFS. If Truecrypt is the decision, then Truecrypt will encode an encrypting file system. On the other hand, EncryptFS will store metadata of each file if there is no hardware encryption. EncryptFS is stackable. Truecrypt has AES, Serpent and Twofish algorithms with RIPEMD-160, SHA-512 and Whirlpool hashes. Finally, I would add a Cisco firewall up to it and add CipherOpics CyperEngine for the router so all outgoing information is encrypted. (Linux+, pg 674-676, 680-81, 2006) (Truecrypt, 2009) (EncryptFS, 2009) (Devx, 2008) (routers, 2008) (phoronix, 2008)
For firewall services, Fedora 10 has a Red Hat firewall application under the System , Administration in the upper left hand corner of Gnome. The first list you see is called trusted services and you check the proper ones like IPP, DNS, Samba, Samba Client, The next list is trusted miscellaneous ports. Don't forget to set Default configuration to Server, because desktop is highlighted on first execution. There is a ICMP filter in Firewall Configuration to send error messages. You can create a blacklist in it easily. Older versions of Linux have IPtables where you can set up which IP addresses pass thru and drop the rest IF the administrator wishes to have access to the 192.168.1.0 network. He/she needs to add iptables –f. Next line: Iptables –P FORWARD Drop, Third line: iptables –a FORWARD –s 192.168.1.0/24 –j ACCEPT. Now that network is accessed, but all other networks are blocked. (Linux+, pg 672-673, 2006)
For the print server, I would use common UNIX printing system (CUPS), because it is newer than some others and allows a computer to act as a print server. Fedora uses CUPS as default print system. In Gnome it is managed by the CUPS manager and taskbar where you can delete print jobs. KDE Print is a CUPS front end too.
To create a CUPS server, first use the Lpstat command to see if any print servers are available which there aren’t, but this command is handy if there are print servers available. To create a print job use lp –d printer1 /etc/inittab. The –d will specify the distribution printer.
More options of lp
Description(Linux+, pg 477, 2006)
-d
Destination
-I
Specifies the ID to modify
-n
Number of pages
-o
Sides – sets if it should be two-sided short edge or two-sided long edge
-q
Specifies the print job priority.

More options of lpstat
Description (Linux+, pg 478, 2006)
-a
Displays a list of all printers that are accepting jobs
-d
Displays the default destination printer
-o printer name
Displays the print jobs in the print queue
-p
Displays a list of printers that are enabled
-r
Shows whether the cups daemon is running
-t
Shows all information about printers and their print jobs
Other commands are cancel followed by the IDs to remove jobs. (Cancel p1-1 p1-2) To remove all jobs there is the –u command. I can restrict users with the lpadmin command. (lpadmin –u allow:root, user1 –u deny:all –d printer 1) The Lpr command is used to print documents to the queue. The lpq is to view the print documents in progress. The lprm command is to remove print jobs. (Linux+, pp 474-478, 2006)
If you need an user interface, there is the Printer Configuration Tool in Linux. Use it to browse queues of CUPS origin. Secondly, in the ‘Add a queue name’ dialog box, add the name of the printer (printer1) and short description. Thirdly, click Forward button to specify the queue type of the new printer and the administrator will select CUPS (IPP) from the drop down menu. Fourthly, use raw print queue (you can try postscript later, but first try raw print queue for compatibility). Click Finished. Finally, click on the new option such as “Printer 1” in Printer Configuration tool and when sharing properties named window comes up, select “This queue is available to all other computers” in the Queue tab. Check the box where it says Automatically find remote shared queues in the General Tab. (Linux+, pg 480-482, 2006)
To allow Windows to be compatible with CUPS, you must install Adobe driver from their website. I will be using the Adobe driver for this paper. To use the CUPS driver, go to Add Printer in Control Panel and select Connect to a Printer on the Internet option. When you see a textbox, copy and paste the URL of printer queue such as http://hostname:/631/printers/Printername. Don’t use Generic PostScript Printer, but browse for the /etc/cups/ppd/PrinterQueneName.ppd. To add Windows support for CUPS, you must install the extracted cups-windows-6.0-1.i386.rpm driver to the /usr/share/cups/drivers directory and cups-windows-6.0-1.x86-64.rpm 64-bit drivers to the /usr/share/cups/drivers/ directory. The Windows cups can be downloaded off of http://www.cups.org/software.php. All Windows machines Windows 2000 or above will be backwards-compatible with CUPs post script. Apple had CUPS integrated into MAC OS 10 since 2002. (Owlfish, 2003) (Linux+, pg 478-483, 2006) (CUPS, 2009)
Linux users are supposed to go in Printer Configuration box and select the Printer 1 Queue available. In Windows, click on Add Printer in Control Panel than go down to option “connect to a printer on the Internet.” Use the URL http://hostname:631/printers/RawPrinterQuetename. When completed, the administrator will be able to have print server in windows from a Linux OS. (Owlfish, 2003)
To connect MAC OS 10 to a print server, first select the Print & Fax pane in the System Preferences. Secondly, in MAC OS 10.4, it is only a + icon, but in MAC OS 10.3, there is a Set up Printer at the top of the Window. Thirdly, IN Mac OS 10.3, click the IP Printing from the drop down menu whereas in MAC OS 10.4, click on IP Printer in the Print Browser window. Fourthly, both MAC OS 10.3 and 10.4, select the IPP Option. Fifthly, type in the hostname. Sixth, you’re supposed to type in the Queue field, the IP address. (RIT, 2006) (Danka, 2002)
The Samba file server supports Windows and MAC OS 10. Samba file server will allow Windows users to drag and drop files on a Linux server. Since Fedora 8, Samba is packaged with the OS. First, the administrator has to enable network activity to the SAMBA server. Enable the Ethernet device in Network Configuration Tool. Secondly, the administrator needs to update firewall settings so the Samba server is trusted. In Fedora, click on Security level in System Settings or “system-config-securitylevel”. Aft wards select the Ethernet card so it is a trusted device. Thirdly, configure the Service Configuration so that smb is enabled. Fourthly, logins should be configured. To do this, create user logins using the Gnome User Manager too. There is also a shortcut command, system-config-users. Add users as you need and then think about what directories you will need to access in the SAMBA server. Fifthly, I will need to configure a SAMBA server. This can be done by opening SAMBA inside Server Settings. This will make changes to a file called smb.conf in /etc/samba. From the menu, choose Server Settings than Samba. When the application loads, please press the preference menu and server settings. Use the Windows workgroup name. The authentication mode should be user if the logins are Microsoft ADS. Sixthly, you must add users to it with the Preference menu and the Samba user item. Eighth, add a shared folder by clicking on the add button using the SAMBA services configuration window with one shared directory. Ninth, the administrator will reboot the SAMBA services by clicking from the menu, System Services, Server Settings, and then Services submenu to open Service Configuration window. From there is a restart icon. In the tenth step, the administrator will be in Windows. This can be accessed by the Start menu, run command. Type in \\linuxserver.test.org (plan A) or \\10.2.2.3 (the ip address is plan B). The eleventh step should be signing in with one of the names created in SAMBA in the Server login Window. Once this is done, there should be a SAMBA window in there. (reallylinux, 2006) (Linux+, pg 664 -665, 2006)
To connect a MAC OS 10 PC to a SAMBA Linux server, the user needs to hit Apple key + K key to bring up a server address dialog box. Secondly, the user will need to type in smb://10.2.2.3 in the textbox. Third, you select your SMB mount. Fourth, the user will add the Windows Workgroup name which doubles as Samba workgroup name in the first box, and your username and password in the second and third textboxes. To disconnect from Samba, you should press CTRL+Click (mouse) and then click on Eject text on the dropdown menu of *directory in question*. (techrepublic, 2008) (Linux+, pg 664 -665, 2006)
The server will need Apache web server to host a web site listing company information. Apache is the most popular web server in the world. Apache web server has been included with Fedora for at least 2 years now so it should be on my Installation DVD. If Apache is already installed I would type in the terminal, rpm –q httpd. If some like http-1.7.1-7.2.fc10 shows up in the terminal than Apache is already installed. The administrator should have included it from the installation DVD, but if for some reason he/she wants the latest version, I found how to install and configure Apache web server. In the terminal, you should type su – install http. Launch to see the status of the Apache web server type su - /sbin/service httpd status in the terminal. To start Apache when the system boots add /sbin/chkconfig –level 3 httpd on. (howtoforge, 2008) (Linux+, pg 663, 2006) (Techotopia, 2007)
Now I am about to configure the Apache server for the domain name. Open up a text editor such as Gedit in Linux and edit the httpd.conf file in the etc/httpd directory. First type ServerAdmin webmaster@myexample.com with serverAdmin as your real name. Next, type in Servername myexample.com with the server name as the real name. Afterwards define where the web site files are going to be located with the documentroot command. An example would be DocumentRoot /var/www/myexample.com. I would create a html file with Open Office or Gedit and save as index.html in the /var/www/Myexample.com directory. The final step would be restart the server by using su - /sbin/service httpd restart. (howtoforge, 2008) (Linux+, pg 663, 2006) (Techotopia, 2007)
Commands for Apache
Description (Linux+, pg 663, 2006)
Listen 80
Specifies that the Apache daemon will listen to HTTP on port 80.
Servername server1.class.com
Specifies that the name of the local server is server1.class.com
DocumentRoot “/var/www/html”
Specifies that the document root directory is /var/www/html
Directoryindex index.html
Specifies that the index.html file in the document root directory will be sent to clients
Errorlog /var/log/httpd/error_log
Specifies that all Apache daemon messages will be written to the /va/log/httpd/error_log file.
MaxClients 150
Sets the maximum number of simultaneous requests to 150.
User apache
Specifies that the Apache daemon will run as a apache local user account
Group Apache
Specifies that the Apache daemon will run as a apache group user account

To get DHCP operating in Fedora 10, the packages should already be on the installation DVD and otherwise go to the URL http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pub/fedora/linux/releases/10/Everything/x86_64/os/Packages/ and search for DHCP-4.0.0-30.fc10.x86_64.rpm and dhclient-4.0.0-30.fc10.x86_64.rpm. Secondly, the next set of directions is if for any reason the DHCP files weren’t installable from the installation DVD or that version is too outdated. Third, you type $./configure $make. Fourth type in $ sudo make install in the terminal. . Fifth, once the DCHP program is compiled in GCC, now I should type in sudo cp server/dhcp.conf /etc. Sixth, you must configure the settings to match my system settings. Seventh, for help on configuration options, type in man dhcp-options in the terminal. Eighth, in the terminal type in sudo touch /var/lib/dhcp/dhcp.leases to get your configure checked for human errors. Ninth, the administrator is allowed to activate DHCP by typing in the terminal: $ sudo chkconfig --level 35 dhcpd on. Finally, the administrator will need to restart the DHCP by typing in the terminal: $ /etc/init.d/dhcp restart. (askdavidtaylor, 2006) (Linux+, pg 662, 2006)
After all this, the server and workstations should be secure and ready to go. I did Windows, MAC OS 10, and Linux to the Fedora print servers, I logged Windows, Linux, and MAC OS 10 to the file server.

Thursday, January 10, 2002

In this report, I will tell how open source software and Linux can be used to reduce costs in the nature of hardware, software, and operating systems in the long term.
Large corporations have been open source for years and continue to use these operations. Small businesses are beginning to look at Linux or OpenSolaris. Small businesses can use VoIP, because the operating system supports it. The software is free, but people with Red Hat Enterprise Workstation/Server or Suse Enterprise Workstation/server or Ubuntu server purchase contracts for tech support. For best performance, you can use Gnome/KDE on Opensolaris distribution and it’ll run like closed source Solaris 10 would, and why it was popular in the first place. Otherwise, you can run Red Hat Workstation Linux and some commercial mature Windows emulator such as Crossover Linux which costs $39.99 instead of $139 for Windows XP Pro/XP x64/Vista Business/7.0 Business. Then, it is possible for employees to be able to execute Microsoft Office 2007 and other specialized software off their Linux workstations through emulators if need be. Otherwise, Administrators can compile Linux Unified Kernel, Wine v1.0, and integrate it into the Linux operating system manually to run Windows applications at no charge. LUK can run Adobe Photoshop on Linux, not native Linux software. [davidtavarez, 2008][Linux, 2008][ neteasyinc, 2008][Codeweavers, 2008]
Windows Server 2008/2008R2 or Windows Vista/7.0 cost money to purchase the OEM to license tech support. The closed source 3rd party software costs money for GPO tools, because companies who develop for Microsoft are usually trying to make a profit off customers. GNU is a non-profit organization with continuously updated applications, because of endless bug reports from all over the world. The major hardware vendors submit hardware drivers to the Linux kernel team to integrate free of charge. The IBM blade servers have Cell Broadband Engines or Cell-based PPC, and Linux recognizes that RISC CPU. Sometimes Blade Servers can have two CBE and XDR RAM in it. That’s like 7 SPEs and 1 PPE per CBE at 3.2 GHz. It makes these servers very fast. Closed source software won’t recognize CBE yet. There are places like South America and Asia that want affordable PCs and that is part of the reason. Another reason is the Department of Defense, and NASA are funding Linux so that the government can see stability for all their many supercomputers. (IBM, 2006)
With Suse Enterprise Server, you can run Apache software for servers which is open source. This is cheaper than Microsoft IIS to run MySQL. Suse Enterprise also supports DHCP, Postfix, DNS, IMAP, Samba, System Statistics (Uses MRTG), User management, Proxy Server. They serve the same file systems. Personally, I always used ReiserFS over EXT3, because it is noticeably faster than the latter. However, EXT4 file system is out in Suse Enterprise 11, OpenSuse 11.2, Redhat Enterprise 5.3, and Fedora 10 so I recommend workstations switching to that file system later this year. EXT4 is supposed to be the flagship file system of Linux as of either Fedora 10 or kernel 2.6.28 and better Linux so I recommend that best solution for workstations if you have either EXT3 or ReiserFS right now. EXT4 is more stable, faster and less fragmented than NTFS for Windows 6.0. Afterwards, Suse 10.1 switched back to the flagship Linux file system, EXT3 so the administrator had to switch file systems again for a speed boost. ReiserFS can handle a lot of small files better than EXT3 and is as mature as EXT3, because both came out in 2001, not including betas. High performance Linux servers use OCFS2 file system, because it’s faster than ReiserFS or EXT4. OCFS2 isn’t as forgiving as EXT3, EXT4 or ReiserFS when concerning unintentional power offs, is but the best server file system out there not in beta. OCFS is an option in most Linuxes since 2006. OCFS2 has also less latency than NTFS. (oracle, 2008)(devx, 2004),
The installers Linux have now-a-days makes installing a breeze especially the Yast Control Panel in any Suse distribution. The ideal way would involve a small army of technicians to execute this installing on workstations so the secret administrator password may stay secret. Someone should burn a DVD per PC with the passwords and file system instructions on paper. The company should make the employees to split the cost of a DVD spindle, use the Administrator and his network technicians install Linux off the DVDs at the similar times. Either way would save a few $1000 on otherwise buying Microsoft licenses and legit Windows OEM CDs. Pirating would be a type of security fraud holding the company accountable.
A lot of open source software is highly robust at an early stage of development and mature open source projects are setting new industry standards. In comparison closed source software has typically a defect report that needs to be filed and then a delay before the vendor determines when or whether to issue new bug fix. What makes open source better is users aren’t at the mercy of the vendor. The open source developers are pride and kudo driven so they want to have the most robusts software before adding features. The motivation to fix bugs is much higher if the source code is freely available. Another important reason why open source software can reduce costs is the stability. The closed source software can be outdated and assist an task, because if it works then end users aren’t motivated to spend more money to upgrade when it suits their needs. If a software supplier can establish a monopoly, force upgrades, than profits are high. One of the motivations is to add improved file formats and applications that can decode/encode them. Users will feel isolated with older versions. With huge amounts of server space, open source provides source code to compile an old version that is compatible with the business needs. Security holes are filled much quicker, because a third party can audit the vulnerability or exploit and send the reports and easily submit a report and expect a fix within 3 months. The GNU actually claims that Linux has less virus vulnerabilities in security breaches or hack attacks with a commercial firewall, because it is newer than Windows kernel in terms of years. Open Source identifies software that is being attacked, yet unlike closed source code will see vulnerability assessment scanners. Vulnerability assessment scanners look for vulnerabilities in configured systems on purpose. [gbdirect, 2008] [DWheeler, 2008]
In terms of Apache servers, open source software can reverse engineer a draft specification into the real product very quickly outpacing that of closed source developers and business strategy. Apache was used with IBM open source since 1998 and is more popular than Microsoft IIS on a year to year basis. The idea is when these open source projects source code is downloadable, it keeps companies from monopolizing file formats. Open source believes it is more business flexible than closed source software, because it allows any business to download whatever they need instead of having features from commercial software that is less than what the company needs. The company isn’t restrained by the software this way so that it is a specifically-built IT platform. The only over-dependency in open source is the requirement of upgrade to new versions that are more stable, faster, more backwards compatible with data formats. Important projects never die, and any group of programmers can resurrect a project if need be as it is passed on. A lot of how toos are documented at Linux vendors website, official forums, unofficial Linux forums, and vendor’s wikis so there is no shortage of support. Because the source code is freely available, organizations are not limited to obtaining support from the authors. The developers of Apache, MySQL, and high profile projects speak of the amount of high-reliability these software process that tech support isn’t a high profile priority even though the vendor does that job. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
With Linux on System Z mainframes, there is more efficient server platforms increased utilization rate, almost doubling from 36% to 79% compared to Microsoft IIS. Linux would reduce possible scalable servers resulting in power savings. Cutting edge applications, especially web-centric applications, are usually made for Linux first, because it is a product of the Internet. According to IBM virtualization today is more mature on RISC and mainframe platform than x86 servers. If Linux was employed, it would have less server footprints. Linux has better compatibility with unified user management available on RISC and mainframe systems. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
Linux is more compatible with high performance computing workloads. These replaced enterprise workloads. Linux has a 10% year to year growth now which is about 13.4% of worldwide factory server revenue. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
Mainframes like System Z have Integrated Facility for Linux processors to accelerate performance of Linux that runs on their servers resulting in the total number of Linux instances increased compared to Linux without IFL. If your system is still x86 based, IBM’s chiphopper program can provide economic benefits. Although, a business doesn’t really need chiphopper. The PowerVM Lx86 emulator will run x86 Linux programs without source code modification. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
With Linux running on System Z the annual savings for 100 users could be 60% IT infrastructure improvement, 25% user productivity improvement, and 14% IT staff productivity increase. Significant cost saves were realized in terms of power/cooling and space utilization with System Z mainframes. With Linux, the downtime was 53 minutes a year compared to five hours with Windows Server. IT staff were able to optimize resources, increase IT service levels, reduce staffing in datacenters and the help desk. (IBM, PDF, 2008)
Pretty much with the hardware reorganization like Cell Broadband Engine, the free updates, the LUK/Wine emulation and fast file systems over Windows; our company is better off cost, hardware and software wise. Linux will always get better, and with closed software, you never know when it’ll go in reverse as far as stability and functionality. Most likely closed software will be unstable at the beginning of the gone gold date, while open source software has no such limitation.
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